Ning Apps Coming Soon to the Main Page [NOW LIVE!]

[Kyle Ford]

We're excited to announce that Ning Apps now have the ability to appear on the Main page of your network. It's up to individual 3rd-party developers to take advantage of this just-launched functionality, but look for updated versions of Ning Apps to appear over the coming days and weeks.

Here are some overall notes about Ning Apps on the Main page...

- Ning Apps currently appear in the center column of the Main page, and their placement can be adjusted via the "Features" section of the "Manage" tab.

- The "Features" section also allows for easy removal of Ning Apps Main page placements (while retaining the standard "Tab" placement). The "Edit" button in the upper-right corner of Ning Apps Main page placements acts as a shortcut to the "Features" section.

Here are a few things to note for Ning Apps you may currently have installed...

- If you have an existing Ning App installed, it won't automatically appear on your Main page. If you'd like to keep it that way, no action is required. 

- If you would like to add the Main page placement for an already-installed app, there are two scenarios:

1) If the 3rd-party developer has updated their app to support the new Main page placement, you can add it to the Main page by visiting the "Features" section, then dragging the app's icon into your Main page layout area.

2) If the 3rd-party developer hasn't yet updated their app to support the new Main page placement, you can still prepare for the future. Just visit the "Features" section and drag the app's icon into your Main page layout area. An invisible "placeholder" module will be created on the Main page, and the app's Main page view will automatically appear once it's added by the 3rd-party developer.

Here are a few things to note for new Ning Apps that you install going forward...

- If a 3rd-party developer is taking advantage of the new Main page functionality, a placement will automatically appear on the Main page when installing a new Ning App.

- If a 3rd-party developer isn't yet taking advantage of the Main page placement but decides to support it in the future, their newly-added Main page placement will automatically appear on your Main page when they enhance their app. NOTE: This automatic placement addition only applies to Ning Apps installed after today's release, not for pre-existing Ning Apps (as outlined above). If you want to install a new Ning App but not have a Main page view automatically appear in the future, simply visit the "Features" section, then drag the app's "placeholder" module out of your Main page layout area.

[solo]

aswome

[joseph lariosa]

damn.. cant w8 for this one.. :D thumbs up!

[Brian Floe]

if only we could use Ning apps, but according to Ning we're down from 4 to 2 seconds before visitors move on and Ning apps take between 5-8 seconds to load. Even when I test them myself I'm thinking they are not working until they suddenly appear on the page.

So now we got something Ning is advising us not to use, which we can now place on our front page.

Shouldn't speed improvements come first?

[Phil McCluskey]

Hi Brian,

Since the Ning Apps operate in iFrames on the Main page, they won't contribute to a significant delay in the overall page rendering time. As you note though, they may appear to load after the rest of the native content on your page has appeared; this is because they are built in client side javascript, and need to be downloaded and run within each visitor's browser. This also limits the speed improvements that can be made. If you think the slight delay is likely to be a jarring experience for your visitors, then you can remove them from the front page as Kyle suggests. An alternative would be to place them below the fold on the Main page, so that they're visible and active when the visitor or member scrolls down the Main page, but aren't seen by the majority of visitors while the page loads.

[Brian Floe]

Hi Phil

Thank you for responding to the speed issue with Ning apps, I really appreciate this. I have been trying to get someone /anyone to comment on this earlier with no luck. It's so comforting when a direct and open conversation can take place surrounding these issues. So thanks again.

- I don't think we can refer to this a "my concern" when Ning promotes the 2 second rule (down from the 4 second rule). Before I read Nings posts on this subject I was not so much aware that we actually only have a few seconds to catch the users attention. I think Ning has openly told us already that it is indeed a concern if a page takes more than 5 seconds to load.

- It's not really the loading on the main page we are talking about, since this is something we have yet to experience, but the actualy Ning App page itself. Our visitors go to a Ning App page and is greeted with a blank area for the app. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 -- 8 seconds later the app appears.

- In those 5-8 seconds are the visitors greeted with a promptly displayed "LOADING" process bar? Nope, a blank area. I just went to a music app on one of my network and counted 11 seconds FROM the page was loaded showing a blank area till the app was loaded. During those 11 seconds a "loading" appeared after about 6 seconds and lasted about 2 seconds and then disappeared.

- We write "BETA" in the menu item name IF we use a Ning app at all. This is just to alert our visitors that something here is not running the way it's supposed to.

I don't see how I can use Ning apps when they require 3 times the loading time that Ning is telling me I should expect my visitors to wait.

If there is no way to speed up the current implementation of the Ning Apps, it sounds like the whole concept is in trouble? Perhaps after the important changes coming in july has been done, a different solution can be researched for Ning Apps? How would facebook be doing if their apps required 5-8 seconds (or 11) to load? If we want success, should we not be looking at the weak parts of the chain?

Having said that, I am so excited about the upcoming strategy that Ning has layed out. I can't wait for HTML text boxes header and footer, facebook and twitter login, API access (can't wait to hear more about this), member statistics etc.

I am also hoping with Nings new focus on serious and paying NCs that the old plans will be revived:
1) video, photo, blog and group "channels" / categories,
2) built in podcasting,
3) forum subcategories
3,5) also with better quoting functionality and where one of the "reply to this" is changed to "reply and quote this",

I also hope that we can get an extra "flag" option to change the photos privacy from public to friends only or private (for when members upload content that does not comply with the networks intention/mission/subject but at the same time is not really "offensive"). There used to be a privacy option when people were uploading content. But this feature was removed by mistake in one of the Ning updates (I was told by support) so now they have to set it globally in their settings or do it afterwards for each item they upload one at a time.

I am very excited about the new direction Ning has taken and I support your efforts all the way. But to make Ning better we have to address the issues that need to improve. Ning rocks!

[Cleopatra]

Well said Brian.I see all those 3rd party App's as mere toys for kids.Some are not working,while some take eternity to load.Come July,speed is number ONE change i expect to see.

[Jen]

Brian,
Well said, and I agree completely.

Although I love the idea of Ning Apps, with the freedom of OpenSource, etc...They load too slow, period. For me, I don't care what the "reason" is. I just want to see a "solution", someday soon.

Team Ning, I have tremendous respect for the platform and your combined skills and talents. I just want to be clear about this. Probably 99% of the Ning NCs feel the same (if they have installed a Ning app), no doubt about it.

I don't want to see them go away, because it's a great way to open the doors to more talented developers and to offer many apps to NCs. But I do hope the speed improves someday, in a major way.

I certainly agree that Ning Rocks! But, this is one of those grey areas for me - - speed, that I so hope gets better and better. ;-)

Best,
Jen

[Ken]

I've tried to add the apps.io listings and polldaddy to my main page - but neither of these appear!

Anyone else had any success in adding an NING app to the main page via the ''Manage->Features'' section?

Ken

[Patrick Chappelle]

you should re-read kyles post for your answer.

[Patrick Chappelle]

attempted to place rss pages on the main page, but no placeholder module. i know it's creator has been m.i.a. of late, so i did not expect the app to show, but again, there was no placeholder module (or is it invisible to nc's as well?).

in addition, the rss page itself would not display my feeds, after i placed it on the main page. so it seems that if we move an application to the main page, the page it would normally occupy will remain blank. yes?

[Jen]

Kyle,
IMO, probably be good if you changed the title of this Discussion. I checked back here several times, and didn't realize this was live until I saw it first on the Developer network.
Best,
Jen

[Thomas Hoey]

Same thing with me.